The pledge to grant state and private properties equal protection in China's draft property law, which is under parliament deliberation, accords with the Constitution, said law experts and lawmakers on Thursday.

 

After an unprecedented seven times of reading since 2002, the draft property law was submitted Thursday morning to the annual session of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, for deliberation by nearly 3,000 lawmakers.

 

The draft embodied the principle of indiscriminated protection to different property owners, a spirit enshrined in the Constitution, by stipulating that state, collective and private properties enjoy equal protection of the law, said Sun Xianzhong, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS).

 

To give different property owners equal protection is the demand of the market economy, which requires different players in the market enjoy equal rights, follow same rules and shoulder same responsibilities, said Wang Jiafu, a civil law expert with the CASS.

 

"If the market players are not placed on an equal footing, the market economy in our country will surely have no way to go," Wang told Xinhua, noting that the socialist market economy is the economic pattern stipulated in the Constitution.

 

Discrimination against private owners in property protection will dampen people's enthusiasm in creating social wealth, and will thus impede the growth of national economy and harm social harmony, said Hu Kangsheng, head of the legislative affairs committee under the NPC Standing Committee, adding the law brooks no encroachment of state properties.

 

The draft property law is expected to be voted by the lawmakers with the draft corporate income tax law on March 16, when the NPC session ends.

 

(Xinhua News Agency March 9, 2007)